Dawww, thanks Fran. You made my day.
On a girlfriend:
I excel at lowering my IQ to blend in socially. Particularly around attractive women.
Be that as it may, I found a girl who is wayyyyy smarter than I am in math and science. Kind of funny, humanities guy-STEM girl. We have our spheres of expertise that we consult each other in. It looks symbiotic to us and parasitic to everybody else outside the relationship.
On the nic:
Ivanhoe is one of my favorite books, I liked the nickname Des, and the mysterious tourney participant seems to match my forum persona. I didn't think of the confusion it would cause for Spanish speakers in particular.
When I first got here, I would get messages from random latinas asking me what was wrong. Whoooops!